I don't enjoy Adom II because the levels are too big

[shockeroo]

Hi All!

Forgive the blunt title; I'm genuinely not here to start an argument, just to give my feedback on ADOM II.

I'm a 10+ year very spoiled ADOM player and have spent hundreds if not thousands of hours on ADOM, love the game to bits and still play from time to time. I've had a few attempts at getting into ADOM II but just get frustrated with the scale of the levels. It also seems to take quite a bit longer to level your character which I'm not fond of either, but the dungeon levels are the major killer for me. Even wandering around Terinyo annoys the blazes out of me because it's so darn big. For me - and I appreciate not everyone will be of the same opinion - the great appeal of ADOM was the bite-sized nature of the action. You level quickly, the levels are screen-sized, most of the quests are likewise nice and small in scope. If I wanted to play a sprawling epic, I'd play Skyrim (incidentally, I dislike Skyrim too!)

ADOM was great for me not in spite of, but because of limitations such as small, screen-sized levels. I fear I'll never love ADOM II the same because of the increased scale. I'm quite sure many of you will disagree and that Thomas has his vision, but for me at least, I see an inferior game from the start.

Best Regards,

Kevin

[Dervi]

Hmm? I don't find the levels in ADOM II that big... Half of the levels generated in dungeons are quite small. But I play with immersive mode on, so it probably biases my vision.

Concerning character leveling, there is a turning point in the game: the moment "large" creatures start to appear in the dungeons (trolls, ogres, hydras). Where orcs and goblins will give 10-50 xp per kill, large creatures will give 500-1000 xp per kill. I try to find leveling from 1 to 10 *much* slower than leveling from 10 to 30...

[Al-Khwarizmi]

I don't personally find levels too big either. I did, in previous versions (0.2.0 I think), but now only some of the levels are big, and others are small. The variation is nice.

Some of the big levels may be a bit too boring because you always see the same kind of monsters, and the same with cities, but I think that will sort itself out when the game has more variety (more monsters, dungeon features, city services, etc.)

About character levelling, maybe it depends on playstyle but I find it significantly faster than in ADOM I. I have played characters that started, levelled to lvl. 17-19, and died in less than an hour and a half. It takes me longer to reach that level in ADOM I.

[quik]

I also like the style of fixed screen-size dungeons of ADOM over the style of bigger than screen dungeons of Crawl, for instance.

[JellySlayer]

I don't have a problem with the size of the levels, myself. The only thing that really bothers me as far as that is concerned is that there's no easy way to find secret doors, so it is really hard to be certain that you've explored everything.

[grobblewobble]

there's no easy way to find secret doors

Yes, that's a problem sometimes. I often mine toward the most likely region, instead of searching the secret passage.

[Al-Khwarizmi]

Perhaps with big levels the purpose of secret doors could be modified. For example, secret doors could be generated in such a way that they could lead to secret useful rooms (altars, vaults, treasure rooms, etc.) but that a secret door would never be necessary to find the down stairs or other necessary features.

Of course, hand-crafted quest-related dungeons could contain exceptions to that rule.

[Toll]

IMO, secret doors should primarily lead to interesting rooms. Mainly those with high threat enemies and treasure. Sort of a reason to have it secret. On the odd occasion let it lead to a more mundane room or a trap room and so forth.